On Sept. 13, 1991, when Jason Kidd informed coach Lou Campanelli that he would attend Cal, the face of Bears basketball changed.

Campanelli had injected renewed excitement into a program that had been dormant for 30 years, but Kidd was the player who pushed Cal to national prominence. Cal had not been ranked since 1960 when Kidd arrived, but three games into Kidd's career, the Bears were No. 25.

That's why Kidd's No. 5 jersey will be retired in a 6:45 p.m. ceremony Saturday at Haas Pavilion prior to the Cal-Stanford game.

"He brought Cal to the forefront and he brought attention to Bay Area basketball," Cal coach Ben Braun said.

Stanford basketball also seemed to take off right after Kidd's arrival. The Bears blew out a weak Stanford team in Kidd's two games against the Cardinal as a freshman, with Kidd collecting 13 assists in just 20 minutes in the latter.

After Kidd's freshman year, Stanford came up with its most important recruit in the Mike Montgomery era, point guard Brevin Knight, whose presence helped launch the Cardinal into the big time. Knight was the hero in Stanford's only win over Kidd's Bears, an 88-79 victory at Maples Pavilion in Knight's freshman season. Kidd, then a sophomore, had one of his four collegiate triple-doubles in that game, with 15 points, 18 assists and 10 rebounds.

Kidd had another big effort in his final game against Stanford, getting 22 points, nine assists and six rebounds in the Bears' 80-62 win at Harmon Gym on Feb. 17, 10 years ago.

Kidd was named first-team Associated Press All-American as a sophomore), but Kidd's biggest moment came as a freshman, when he led the Bears to a second-round NCAA Tournament victory over defending champion Duke.

"That got everybody's attention," Braun said.

It landed Kidd on the cover of Sports Illustrated and prompted voters to rank Cal No. 6 in the preseason polls the next season. One could argue that Harmon Gym would not have been enlarged to Haas Pavilion were it not for Kidd.

Now another freshman from Oakland, Ayinde Ubaka, is the Bears' starting point guard, and like Cal during Kidd's freshman season, the Bears are building momentum as the season goes on. Cal was just 10-7 when the Bears changed coaches and went on a roll that did not end until the third round of the NCAA Tournament in 1993. This season's Bears began 6-8, but have won five of their past six games.

Ubaka never saw Kidd play at Cal in person, but said Kidd's past in Berkeley had some influence on his decision to play for the Bears.